About The Gower Dough Co
In the beginning [Early 2020]
It started on the brink of the pandemic as I worked for the NHS and as mama-bear to a toddler. This business was only intended to be a ‘side hustle’- catering for the odd wedding and festival event over the summer!
Within a few weeks of launching The Gower Dough Co, we were fully booked for the summer season with wedding bookings scattered throughout the year. But with COVID-19 came cancellations and we needed to get this little pizza trailer off the ground. We launched a delivery service from our home in Gower and, with the support of our local community, were busier than we could ever imagine. As we could only deliver within a short radius, and with an increasing number of customers wanting a taste of the action, our deconstructed “make-at-home”pizza kits were born; with our delivery area rapidly expanding.
We moved into a shared unit in Crofty and we bought a bus (erm, Craig bought a bus, I still don’t remember agreeing to that one)… After two whirlwind months, I left my full-time job knowing The Gower Dough Co was no longer a ‘side-hustle’ and we were in deep!
Our first ‘Covid-safe’ gigs were Margam Country Park in the summer of 2020 followed by the OG Swansea Bay Pop-up (the one with the big circus tent). At this point, Craig left his full time fire-fighter job to focus on the business too.
Through the rest of the year, our trailer (Saffie) and bus (Ruby) catered smaller-scale events including birthday parties and Christmas parties (for ‘essential’ businesses that were still able to open) and made local deliveries around our base in Crofty. They say don’t quit while you’re ahead, so we launched ‘Gower Dough Presents’ in December 2020 too – a COVID-safe, family friendly drive-in cinema, with Ruby dishing out the goods.
How we’re doing [Sept 2022]
We made it out of the other side of COVID, adding a bar to our set up, as well as tentage, power, sound and lighting equipment. Since then we’ve made so SO many pizzas for weddings across Gower, Swansea, Carmarthenshire, Brecon, Yorkshire(!)… festivals, music gigs, pop-ups and corporate open days. We’ve moved into our own unit space – Craig’s labour of love conversion – and if that’s not enough I’ve somehow managed to graduate as a Bachelor of Science from The University of Bristol (cheers Dr Darryl Hill!)
Our little man is still hanging in there, he’s turned five and is killer at folding boxes in his spare time!
A big thank you, to you, our customers, for making this happen, supporting local, supporting small and most importantly – supporting friends. Cheers to that!
Where we’re heading
Keep following, and I guess you’ll find out 🙂
Beki xx
